But somehow or other the three of them squeezed and bumped along, a precarious existence really, which would have been utterly impossible if it hadn't been for Janet. She it was, who held the purse strings. She it was who cooked sad looking, unpalatable, but none the less nourishing, stews and broths. You should have seen Janet during one of those solemn conclaves with the young lawyer whom Justice Harlow had assigned to the case. He was a frankly gloomy lawyer. He was sure they were wasting time and money and energy in their attempt to make the house habitable—he didn't believe it was possible, he didn't think that even another thirty days extension of time could be procured and as for the debts on the property, they looked to his impoverished purse like the combined national debts of all the Americas. He was a very young lawyer. He was sorry, he said he was sorry, protesting that he was doing everything on earth he could do to help "The Case." He always called the house "The Case."
Janet called him back one night after the two younger women had left. She informed him bluntly that she didn't think he was anything much of a lawyer. He retorted hotly that he'd done everything any lawyer could do. Janet eyed him cannily.
"Where might ye be livin'? You're no married?"
He admitted his single blessedness; he named his address; he on further urging named his room rent. And Janet came back at him with a practical ferocity that was magnificent.
"If you're so keen on helping my little lady why are ye no livin' here and paying her rent?"
He murmured things about neighborhoods and slums and not being able to afford to live in such a hole and appearances and other futile excuses. But in the end he followed her meekly up the stairway and was shown the glories of Grandy's old room. It was a huge cavern of a room, a whale of a room, with a curtained alcove holding a stately bed, with wide windows overlooking the bay and a low squatty chair beside the fireplace. While he was looking Dulcie tripped down the stairs and winked solemnly at Janet. And she too assailed him. He hadn't an argument left when the two of them were through with him. He felt like a henpecked Mormon husband; he was red with wrath at the Sculptor Girl's cool bossiness; he loathed the very idea of living in the same house with such a person. Especially when she told him bluntly, that he'd have to go to Felice and beg to be taken in. Felicia mustn't know that he'd been "influenced" she put it.
In the end he capitulated, clambering up to the nursery and tapping meekly on the door, stammering as he made his request.
But he'd his reward straight with—the reward of her wide, sincere smile.
"How stupid I was not to offer it to you! Of course you must have longed for it directly you saw it—oh, do you know I think you must have felt it was just the place for a lawyer! Shall I tell you something—" she was down the stairs, running like a girl to point out the wonders of the room. "You see Grandy's father was a Judge and he knew Louisa's uncle—It was Louisa's uncle who used to live in this house and both those men used to sit in this room and talk and talk and talk—Mademoiselle told me about it. You shall have Grandy's father's picture over the fireplace. We shall bring it up from the hall. It's a beautiful picture—you'll just admire him! And to think— we haven't unpacked the books, Grandy's father's books—" she smiled over her shoulder at Dulcie as she always smiled when she quoted that slangy young person, "That will be Some Law!"
All the same he was young enough so that he apologized profusely to his friends for having such a disreputable lodging,